57 Year Old Lynne Spalding Missing Since 9/21/13 in San Francisco, CA

[grace-land]

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/New-measures-at-S-F-General-after-patient-death-4889340.php

New measures at S.F. General after patient death
Updated 7:26 am, Saturday, October 12, 2013

 
Hospital officials have not said whether an alarm triggered when Lynne Spalding, 57, entered the stairwell after she vanished Sept. 21 from her bed on the fifth floor. But it wasn't until Tuesday that she was found during a routine quarterly check of the stairwell, which was used as a fire escape, officials said. She was found on the fourth floor.

From now on, said Dr. Todd May, the hospital's chief medical officer, staffers and sheriff's deputies who police the hospital must manually deactivate all alarms and check fire escapes when they sound, on top of conducting daily sweeps of all the building's stairwells.


"There are several investigations that need to be completed, but in the meantime, we are taking steps to improve things that can readily be improved - working with alarms on doors, monitoring our stairwells and putting extra procedures in place," said May in an interview at the hospital.

"With our existing staff and the resources we have," he said, "we're doing the things that can minimize security and patient safety risks."

May said the staff met Friday to discuss proactive steps they could take as they waited for various agencies to finish investigations into the death of Spalding, who was being treated for an infection and staying in a medical-surgical unit that had staffed one nurse for every four to five patients the day she disappeared.

Investigations have been launched by San Francisco police and the state health department, while the Sheriff's Department and the hospital are doing internal probes.

Also Friday, the mayor's office announced that officials from UCSF Medical Center will be conducting an independent review of the hospital's procedures and systems for patient safety and security. UCSF now partners with San Francisco General on clinical teaching and research, but not on safety or security systems.
 
Hospital policy requires all patients to stay within their unit, unless escorted by a nurse or doctor to another area for tests or treatment, May said.

He declined to discuss security camera systems in place at the hospital and if they could have helped shed light on Spalding's disappearance.
 

[grace-land]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE
Yesterday.

While Lynne Spalding's family and friends are encouraged by this development, "alarm overload" as quoted by Dr. May in the Chronicle does neither explain nor condone taking 17 days to find her body: especially when those in the "Find Lynne" effort were taking the SF Sheriff's Department & SF General at their word that a thorough search had been conducted of the hospital and its grounds. That was not the case. Again: this is a welcome development but we don't need the "spin" of "alarm overload phenomenon." There are NO excuses for what occurred.
 -- David Perry

[grace-land]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE 
22 minutes ago.

The "BBC" and many other outlets in the United Kingdom have picked up the story of Lynne Spalding's death and the horrible circumstances of her going missing-then-being-found-dead at SF General. We thank them, and the British Consulate here in San Francisco, for all their assistance and sensitivity. As we begin to move through our grief, now we push for "Lynne's Law": mandatory 24/7 video coverage -- recorded and readily accessible -- on ALL hospital entrances and exits.
 -- David Perry

[Amys Sister]

Any time there is a missing person, adult or child, who, after LE has been called to the scene and a search has been conducted, is later found dead on or very near the property from which they went missing I always feel agitation.  It's like your child who claims they can't find their shoes and they've looked everywhere but they're right there in the closet the whole time.

Except in these cases it's people who are missing, not shoes.

[grace-land]

I think it's time for the family to hire a lawyer and consider having a second autopsy performed.  Why all the delays?  Is the autopsy being done at the same hospital where she went missing?  At this point, I have lost trust in their investigation and the possibility of finding the cause of her death.    jmo

http://www.hlntv.com/article/2013/10/15/lynne-spalding-hospital-missing-lawsuit-family

Family seeks answers in missing patient's death
updated 7:21 PM EDT, Tue October 15, 2013

 
At this point, Spalding’s two children have not been able to finalize funeral plans. They are waiting on the cause of death and for Spalding’s remains to be released.

Family spokesperson David Perry says, “it’s been a week since Lynne Spalding’s body was found…family and friends are beyond distraught and beyond patience with the delay. We need an answer, we need a cause of death, we need her remains so we can plan a funeral in her honor.”

Calls to the medical examiner’s office have not been returned. 

But will a lawsuit be next? “There are no plans for that as of yet. Nothing is being ruled out,” Perry says.

[grace-land]

http://www.ktvu.com/news/news/local-govt-politics/sf-general-makes-protocol-changes-after-womans-dea/nbQPG/

Posted: 7:45 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2013
SF General makes protocol changes after woman's death

More than a week after a body was found in a fire stairwell, San Francisco General Hospital says it is making it more difficult for patients to slip through the cracks.

Lynne Spalding, 57, was found dead in a fourth floor stairwell last Tuesday, weeks after she was reported to have disappeared from her room Sept. 21. The San Francisco Sheriff's Department provides security for SF General, and as of Wednesday, there were multiple investigations underway into why a search by deputies did not find her earlier.

The stairwell where Spalding was found had an alarm that shut off once the door closed. Hospital officials Wednesday told KTVU all fire stairwell doors would be outfitted with alarms that requires a key to turn off. Activation of an alarm should also trigger an immediate search by sheriff's deputies.

Hospital staff members were also directed to search the stairwells on daily basis from then on.

“Also, if an alarm goes off near a patient care area, the nursing staff takes an immediate census of their unit," said Dr. Todd May, SF General's Chief Medical Officer.
 

[grace-land]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE
2 hours ago near San Francisco, CA.

media contact: David Perry / (415) 676-7007 / news@davidperry.com

Four Weeks Since Lynn Spalding Entered SF General, Questions Go Unanswered

17 October 2013 -- San Francisco: One month ago, on Thursday, September 19, Lynne Spalding was admitted to San Francisco General for treatment of a urinary tract infection. Two days later, on Saturday, September 21 at between 10:15am and 10:30am she disappeared from her room. Told by San Francisco General Staff and the San Francisco Sheriff's Office that a search of the hospital had been conducted, Spalding's family, friends and the San Francisco Police Department began searching outside the hospital. Thousands of flyers were printed and distributed, social media was activated, friends and family scoured the city looking for Lynne. 17 days after she went missing, Lynne Spalding was found: dead in a stairway at San Francisco General. She had never left.

Now, four weeks since this tragedy began, the family and friends of Lynne Spalding are still awaiting answers. They are awaiting word from the San Francisco Medical Examiner as to the cause of death. They are awaiting the release of her body so that a proper memorial may be conducted.

Lynne Spalding's family and friends are grateful to San Francisco Mayor Edwin M. Lee for his leadership and for arranging an independent review to be conducted by UCSF to assure that a tragedy like this never happens again.

[grace-land]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE
16 hours ago near San Jose, CA.

media contact: David Perry / (415) 676-7007 / news@davidperry.com

Lynne Spalding's Body to be released to family

 17 October 2013, 3:30 -- San Francisco, CA: The family of Lynne Spalding has had word from the San Francisco medical examiner's office that Spalding's remains may be released to the family. Out of respect for the family, specific transport timing of the remains and their destination is being kept private at this time. However, there will be further updates with more specifics shortly. While Lynne Spalding's remains may now be claimed by her family, the final report on the cause and timing of Spalding's death is still under review, the results of which may still take several weeks according to official sources.

[grace-land]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE
about an hour ago near San Francisco, CA.

media contact: David Perry / (415) 676-7007 / news@davidperry.com

18 October 2013 -- San Francisco, CA: The family of Lynne Spalding has retained the legal counsel of San Francisco attorney Haig A. Harris, Jr. (Scampini, Mortara & Harris) to advise them and represent them as the investigation into the death of Lynne Spalding continues

[grace-land]

 

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE
9 hours ago via mobile.

Tonight’s disturbing revelations from the “San Francisco Chronicle” are heartbreak upon heartbreak. Knowing that a human being’s body was left neglected for 17 days in a stairwell of a major American hospital while a search was conducted for her outside the hospital grounds is beyond horrifying and as of yet, without explanation. To now have revealed that apparently Lynne Spalding was discovered – neglected – and then neglected and discovered again is beyond words to convey. The family – as has been the case from the start – had to get its information from the media and not directly from San Francisco General or the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department: the agencies charged with Lynne’s care and safety.

We again thank Mayor Lee for his call for an independent review. We plead with UCSF to be more aggressive, transparent, deliberate, compassionate and urgent in their search for the truth than has appeared to be the case by some personnel at SF General and the SF Sheriff’s Department to date. Only through a thorough airing of the circumstances leading to Lynne’s death can we hope to prevent an abomination of this sort every occurring again.

Just when Lynne’s family and friends had begun to find closure, the wound is reopened by this new and sickening revelation. Lynne Spalding deserved better. The people of San Francisco demand better.
 -- David Perry

[grace-land]

OMG!  How terrible...and incompetent!  imo   

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/S-F-General-worker-had-reported-a-woman-in-4909031.php

S.F. General worker had reported a woman in stairwell
Updated 8:14 am, Saturday, October 19, 2013

A worker at San Francisco General Hospital reported seeing an unconscious woman in a fire-escape stairwell one week before the body of a missing patient was found in the same spot, according to sources familiar with the investigation into the patient's death.

Lynne Spalding, 57, disappeared from her room on the hospital's fifth floor Sept. 21, two days after she was admitted for treatment of an infection. Her body was found Oct. 8 on the fourth-floor landing of the locked stairwell.

The cause of death has not been determined, but police believe Spalding had been dead for several days and was not the victim of foul play, said the sources, who have knowledge of the police investigation but are not authorized to speak publicly.

According to the sources, a hospital orderly told a nurse Oct. 1 that he had seen a woman, apparently passed out, on the fourth floor of the stairwell. The orderly said he had stepped over the prone woman twice, once going downstairs and again when he returned to the fifth-floor door that he had used to enter the stairwell.

The nurse contacted the Sheriff's Department, the sources said. Sheriff's deputies provide security at San Francisco General.

Response unclear

Such a call should have prompted the sheriff's dispatcher to send a deputy to check the stairwell. But police have not been able to determine how the department responded Oct. 1, the sources said. It's possible no deputy responded to the stairwell, they said, or that a deputy was dispatched to the wrong location.

It is also unclear whether the woman was still alive when the orderly found her. There was nothing in the nurse's call to the Sheriff's Department, however, that indicated the woman might have been dead, the sources said.
 

[grace-land]

http://www.ktvu.com/news/news/local/attorney-spalding-family-calls-hospital-share-find/nbTjd/

Posted: 8:27 p.m. Monday, Oct. 21, 2013
Attorney for Spalding family calls on hospital to share findings

SAN FRANCISCO —
The attorney representing the family of the woman who was found dead in a rarely used stairwell at San Francisco General Hospital spoke out on Monday, saying the hospital should share their findings regarding the investigation immediately with the family to help ease their pain.
 
"I had heard that some hospital staff had observed a body on the balcony prior to what is formally being acknowledged as discovered," Haig Harris, the attorney for Spalding's 23-year-old daughter and 19-year-old son told KTVU. "You don't go to a hospital to be treated for a medical condition and die obviously of tragic circumstances all alone out on a balcony."

Harris said he received an email last Tuesday from a source indicating a hospital worker reported seeing what was believed to be a homeless person "sleeping" in the stairwell where Spalding was found.

The Sheriff's Department Monday told KTVU it must wait for the conclusion of those investigations to speak out on the case. Harris is calling for all investigating parties to share their findings immediately with the Spalding family to help them deal with their loss.

"You can't hide the responsibility in this case," said Harris. "There is a moral duty, there is a legal duty to share this investigation with this family."

SF General Monday declined to speak specifically about the ongoing investigation or these latest allegations.

In a statement Saturday, San Francisco General Hospital CEO Sue Currin said, "We feel terrible for Lynne Spalding's family and friends, as this part of the unfolding story must be incredibly painful.

• ur hospital staff...is committed to finding out exactly what happened so that it will never happen again."

[grace-land]

http://www.sfexaminer.com/sanfrancisco/months-before-body-discovered-in-san-francisco-general-hospital-visitor-got-stuck-in-stairwell/Content?oid=2608942

October 22, 2013
Months before body discovered in San Francisco General, hospital visitor got stuck in stairw

Five months before the body of a missing patient was discovered in a rarely used San Francisco General Hospital stairwell, a woman visiting the hospital got stuck in a stairwell and no security personnel came to find her, even after she says an alarm was triggered, according to emails obtained by The San Francisco Examiner.

Lynne Spalding, 57, disappeared from her hospital bed Sept. 21 and her body was discovered Oct. 8 by a hospital engineer performing a regularly scheduled inspection of an emergency exit stairwell. The cause and manner of death remain under investigation.

Months before in June, a woman from San Luis Obispo County who was visiting her son at San Francisco General decided to bypass the elevators to run an errand, according to emails obtained through a public-records request. The emails, in which the woman's identity was redacted, detail her account of what happened next.
 

[MuffyBee]

OMG!  How terrible...and incompetent!  imo   

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/S-F-General-worker-had-reported-a-woman-in-4909031.php

S.F. General worker had reported a woman in stairwell
Updated 8:14 am, Saturday, October 19, 2013

A worker at San Francisco General Hospital reported seeing an unconscious woman in a fire-escape stairwell one week before the body of a missing patient was found in the same spot, according to sources familiar with the investigation into the patient's death.

Lynne Spalding, 57, disappeared from her room on the hospital's fifth floor Sept. 21, two days after she was admitted for treatment of an infection. Her body was found Oct. 8 on the fourth-floor landing of the locked stairwell.

The cause of death has not been determined, but police believe Spalding had been dead for several days and was not the victim of foul play, said the sources, who have knowledge of the police investigation but are not authorized to speak publicly.

According to the sources, a hospital orderly told a nurse Oct. 1 that he had seen a woman, apparently passed out, on the fourth floor of the stairwell. The orderly said he had stepped over the prone woman twice, once going downstairs and again when he returned to the fifth-floor door that he had used to enter the stairwell.

The nurse contacted the Sheriff's Department, the sources said. Sheriff's deputies provide security at San Francisco General.

Response unclear

Such a call should have prompted the sheriff's dispatcher to send a deputy to check the stairwell. But police have not been able to determine how the department responded Oct. 1, the sources said. It's possible no deputy responded to the stairwell, they said, or that a deputy was dispatched to the wrong location.

It is also unclear whether the woman was still alive when the orderly found her. There was nothing in the nurse's call to the Sheriff's Department, however, that indicated the woman might have been dead, the sources said.
 

Stepped over her twice?!  Didn't stop and check her well being?  Check her vitals? He reported her to nurse.  Did nurse go to stairwell?  Check on vitals, check on well being?  Called dispatch?  Follow up?   This poor lady was failed in so many ways.     Did any one of these people follow up?  Or was it just passed along?  Report it and done.  No responsibility I guess.    

[Sister]

ok, maybe I'm dense.

You are in a stairwell of a hospital, you see a person on the floor.  You don't stop to see if you can help?  you don't make sure help was rendered?  you call the Sheriff's Department because they provide "security"?  and go about your business?  what the blazes is wrong with people today?

 

[grace-land]

ok, maybe I'm dense.

You are in a stairwell of a hospital, you see a person on the floor.  You don't stop to see if you can help?  you don't make sure help was rendered?  you call the Sheriff's Department because they provide "security"?  and go about your business?  what the blazes is wrong with people today?

 

Indifference?

[grace-land]

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-patient-body-20131024,0,4994572.story#axzz2ifuQbvP9

Lawyer: Woman spotted in stairwell four days before body was found
October 24, 2013, 1:32 p.m.

 SAN FRANCISCO -- The hospital where a patient vanished and was discovered dead in a stairwell 17 days later told the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department that a woman had been spotted there four days before the patient’s body was found, the lawyer for the woman’s family said Thursday.

Haig Harris, who is representing the children of Lynne Spalding, 57, said a medical official from San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center told him Thursday that an unidentified man was on the emergency exterior stairwell shortly before 7:30 a.m. on Oct. 4, banging on a fifth-floor door to be let in.

A senior hospital employee heard the noise and opened the door, which locks from the outside, Harris said. The man then told her that there was woman lying on the stairwell below near the fourth floor, where Spalding’s remains were later discovered.

“She didn’t go out and walk down to view what was there,” Harris said, but she called the sheriff’s department, which provides security for the city-owned hospital, and reported the sighting.

“We don’t know whether a search was even done,” Harris said.

He said the hospital also has not received any information from the sherriff’s department about its actions in the case. A spokeswoman for the sheriff has declined to comment, citing an ongoing investigation.

The hospital does not know the identity of the man who saw the woman, but said he was wearing a name tag, Harris said.

Harris said the hospital has offered to meet with Spalding’s children to answer any questions they might have, but he has advised his clients against a meeting at this time.

“I told him I would convey the hosptial's condolences and their horror as well,” Harris said. “This doctor made no bones that this is the most horrible thing they have ever encountered.”
 

[grace-land]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE 
October 23 at 10:24pm

Below: the disturbing, and eerie email from an SF General visitor to SF General and to the SF Sheriff's Department. Was this incident a foreshadowing of what happened to Lynne Spalding and could happen to others? Read on: the email speaks for itself. Lynne's family received a copy of this email from members of the press. Its authenticity has been verified by SF General.
 -- David Perry

 10/10/13 via email

 SFGH Stairwell Incident of my own
 to:
 SF General & SF Sheriff's Dept. 10/10/2013 1037 AM:

I saw your names and email addresses on the press release about the recent incident at SFGH. I wanted to relay to you my own incident at SFGH so that you are made aware that there is a potential for things like this to occur, maybe more than you'd like to think.

This story struck me because I had a situation at SFGH in June in one of those stairwells. I was visiting my son at SF General. I was tired of riding up and down in the elevator each time I needed to run an errand, so I entered what I thought was a stairway to go down to the lobby instead. The door was marked with a sign "Stairs" or something similar. I noticed nothing indicating it was a locked exterior stairwell.

When I entered, the door closed behind me and locked. I went up and down the stairs several times, trying doors, knocking loudly on the tiny window that looked out onto the hospital floors at each level. Nurses, visitors and other hospital staff were walking past in the hallways, but no one heard me. I was fearful of going through another door (at the bottom of the stairwell) in case it also locked behind me and I became trapped further.

The door at the bottom of the stairs opened to the outside, and sounded a loud alarm when I opened it. I quickly closed it, walked back up the stairs and pounded on the door and window until finally a passing nurse heard and noticed and let me out. She laughed and asked how I got in there. I told her I simply opened the door and walked in.

At the time, I thought I must look an idiot because surely there had to be security cameras watching me run up and own the stairs trying to get out. And when I opened the bottom door and the alarm sounded, I fully expected security guards or someone to appear. No such thing happened. I can see how someone who was not feeling well, perhaps confused by stress or medications, could find her way into such a stairwell at that hospital. While my incident only lasted about 15 minutes, it was frightening. It's horrible that this woman was not located for so long. There obviously needs to be some changes made!

Atascadero, California

[grace-land]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/FIND-LYNNE/370247543108609

FIND LYNNE
20 hours ago via mobile.

Media Update RE Lynne Spalding
24 October 2013 -- 4:45pm

The family of Lynne Spalding and their attorney, Haig Harris, today received a phone call from Dr. Jeff Critchfield of San Francisco General. Dr. Critchfield began by expressing his condolences and SF General's commitment to uncovering the truth about Lynne Spalding's disappearance, death and subsequent discovery in a stairwell of the hospital. Spalding's family was grateful for the proactive and genuine communication as it has been asking for exactly this sort of effort since Lynne's body was announced discovered on October 8.

Dr. Critchfield reported that on Friday, October 4 at 7:17am a man knocked frantically on the door of stairwell number 8. This resulted in "a senior person" / woman opening the door at which point the person who had knocked said that "there is someone lying on the stairwell between the 3rd and 4th floors."

The individual who reported this, according to Critchfield, was wearing a badge but rushed down the hall and has since not stepped forward or been identified. Authorities are asking this person to come forward to assist in the investigation.

What bearing this report has to week's earlier report from the "San Francisco Chronicle" that an "orderly" or "janitor" saw someone on the SF General stairwell on Tuesday, October 1 -- twice stepping over that person -- is unclear. Dr. Critchfield's only comment was that SF General has not employed orderlies for over 10 years.

Lynne Spalding was admired to San Francisco General on September 19 of this year. She was overnight there for two nights. On Saturday, September 21 at 10:15am a nurse saw Spalding in her room. At 10:30am, a nurse reported that Spalding was not there. According to SF General, a search of the hospital was undertaken by the San Francisco Sheriff's Department. Informed that Spalding could not be found onsite at the hospital, Spalding's family filed a missing person's report with the SF Police Department. For the next two weeks, SFPD was in daily contact with Spalding's family and friends as part of an extensive citywide search.

As of today, the San Francisco Sheriff's Department has not disclosed any details of their alleged multiple searches of San Francisco General or offered any explanation as to how their efforts failed to find the body of a patient that was still within the hospital building.
 -- David Perry, Spalding Family Spokesman

[grace-land]

Rest in Peace, Lynne. 

FIND LYNNE
12 hours ago via mobile.

media contact: David Perry / (415) 676-7007 / news@davidperry.com

 25 October 2013 -- San Francisco: Lynne Spalding was memorialized tonight in a celebration of her life at St. Aidan's Episcopal Church in San Francisco. The ceremony was private. The service was attended by family, friends and colleagues from throughout the Bay Area, California and Great Britain. A reception followed.

 Lynne's family wishes to thank the warm and welcoming congregation of St. Aidan's during this difficult time of personal grief. The family would also like to thank Chapel of the Chimes in Hayward for their respect and sensitivity.

 Donations in Lynne's memory may be made to the St. Anthony's Foundation of San Francisco.
 --- David Perry, Spalding Family spokesman